Books in Italy


As of 2018, two firms in Italy rank among the world's biggest publishers of books in terms of revenue: , and Mondadori Libri. Other large publishers include De Agostini Editore.

History

Germans in Subiaco, Arnold Pannartz and Konrad Sweynheim, in 1464 set up a printing press and produced "the earliest book printed in Italy,...a Latin grammar by Donatus." Printing technology spread in the 1460s to Rome and Venice; in the 1470s to places such as Bergamo, Bologna, Brescia, Cremona, Ferrara, Florence, Genoa, Lucca, Mantua, Messina, Milan, Modena, Naples, Padua, Palermo, Parma, Pavia, Perugia, Piacenza, Reggio Calabria, Treviso, Turin, Verona, Vicenza; and in the 1480s to places such as L'Aquila, Pisa, Reggio Emilia, Siena, and Udine.
At the time of Italian unification and the creation of the Kingdom of Italy in 1861, the Biblioteca Magliabechiana in Florence merged with the, and by 1885 became known as the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale di Firenze. The Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale di Roma formed in 1876. As official legal deposit libraries, both maintain copies of works published in Italy.
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization named Turin the 2006 World Book Capital.

Bookselling

Notable shops in Italy include: